


Salt to the Sea

by AceQueenKing



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Character Death, Families of Choice, Gen, Original Character Death(s), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-30
Updated: 2017-06-30
Packaged: 2018-11-18 14:02:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,810
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11292144
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AceQueenKing/pseuds/AceQueenKing
Summary: Mags has lived through 65 hunger games. She remembers them all.





	Salt to the Sea

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Brachylagus_fandom](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brachylagus_fandom/gifts).



1\. Mags is just six when it all falls apart.

She doesn't remember the Time Before, not really. She remembers the stories her parents told. If she thinks hard, she can just barely remember them talking when they stayed up late, trying to listen to the reports on the radios. She remembers thinking that she would tell her children about radios. She wonders now if she had had them, would they believe her? Believe in the strange little black boxes that were hoarded in homes all over District 4? Believe there had been many different opinions, and music, and languages, all floating to over to them from across the waves?

In the end, it is a moot question; she never has children. 

But she can't let the stories fall away. The story she tells to those who follow her first is her brightest, clearest childhood memory. She remembers the first games, watching the dark, dusty screen of the last movie theater in town being hoisted onto the beach. She remembers gathering there, watching the children of their district as they died on a foreign shore.

2\. She is sixteen when she is called.

The game has run for 11 years, and she's avoided the call for two. But Poseidon is angry the year of the 11th hunger games, and Mags father puts her name in two more times to get a _tessera._ The _t_ _essera_ gives them several loafs of hard, tacky bread that makes her cough even as she wolfs it down.

She's not rated highly by the judges; she's young, gawky, with waders on her feet, a big nose, and wild hair. She's not attractive enough to be interesting, and not competent enough to be dangerous. She's not good with a gun or an arrow, and her best skill with a knife is filleting fishes, cutting the meat from the bone.

She survives because of the skills of her homeland. She survives on a cold and bitter island because she is a strong swimmer, because she knows how to make fishhooks, crab traps. Most of the recruits die of exposure the first two days; not Mags. Mags lives in a cave, eating fish from a stream raw. She clutches a knife between her fingers and hopes she never has to use it against invaders.

When the day finally comes that a fellow competitor invades her cave, starving and wet and mad, Mags finds that humans can be gutted just as cleanly as a fish.

She still sees the girls eyes at night as she gets older. Mags remembers her final moments every moment between sleeping and waking: the girl from District 1, blue eyes wide, an innocent staring into death. The last four come to her starving, bedraggled, and Mags wants nothing more than to give them a fish instead of a knife. She’s too out of it by then, too tired to remember more than flashes of their faces, but they stay with her, living on in her memories  as ghostly regrets.

The abyss threatens to drown her on her worst days. The ghosts stare at her from the shores of the other world on good ones, their regrets and pain lapping against her soul like waves upon the shore. 

3\. When she is 17, she moves into the Victor's Village. It is _not_ optional. She hates it.

The cruelest part of being a victor, she thinks, is that everyone knows what she has done. People in town are thankful for hr victory yet avoid her. On the awful victory tour she's forced to go on, people shy away from her. She stares down at the other districts and thanks them for their sacrifice. All the time, she thinks about how t _heir sacrifices are their children_ and how she wishes, for all the world. She thinks about how things could be different; how she wishes they didn't need to tear one another apart like animals. She is quiet, tame, but the Government never hesitates to poke her, to rip open her wounds.

On the last stop, in District 12, she sees the sister of the First Girl. She isn't identified as such but stands proud, in the front row, her face contorted in rage and sadness. Mags wants to tell her she is sorry but can't; the words die on her tongue, the government too close to allow her to imply their system isn't perfect. Mags is a rebel but she is not a fool.

They let her go after that, but they come back the next year, with hungry hands, demanding new tributes. Mags learns then that there are few crueler things than memory, as she is forced to bear witness to a new sacrifice, once every year.

4\. She is 18 when her first tribute dies.

She dies in the rain; running away from a kid born in District 1. A wealthy kid is hunting her, the sort who gets food every night regardless of the mercurial sea. He's bigger than her, stronger, a few years older; she knows he's what they call a _career_.

" _Run_ ," she remembers telling the girl. Her name is Jessica. She is 14. Her father is a grocer. Mags sees him every time she comes into town. She remembers him well, if only for the fact that he always averts his eyes when he gives her the grocery bag. She has done her best for his daughter; has told her everything she can. " _Run_." She told her. "T _here is no pride to be had in there; run, get to ground. Survive. If you can't beat them, run_."

She runs, little Jessica, runs and runs and runs, but the boy catches her, yanks her head back. She cries out as the boy brings out a machete. Jessica falls back, headless, as the boy screams, releasing a pumped up war-cry into the void. _Killers_ , she thinks. _My God, we are raising our children to be killers._

Jessica is - _was_ \- 14.

A cry goes up on the beach; a loud wail from Jessica's father. Mags throws her hands around him and apologizes and apologizes. As if it can absolve her of her guilt.  
  
Later, she thinks of Jessica's father every time she thinks about marriage. She decides not to marry, in the end. It is easier this way; she does not think she could bear to see the corpse of what was once her child. 

This is just another thing the capital takes from her.

Jessica dives down into her memory, floating with the ghosts that haunt the sea of her thoughts: District 12 girl, eyes wide; her sister, bent on vengeance; Jessica, her head falling from her shoulders; Martin, her other tribute, falling from a cliff-side as he ran away.

She thinks of them each night, a silent litany. The Game continues, the list only grows longer. The district trains their children, tries to make them killers and does so without success - until Finnick.

5\. She is 53 when she meets Finnick O'Dair and she gets her first victor.

She knows as soon as she sees him that he could be a champion. Finnick is the sort of boy who will inevitably become a leader in any society; good-looking, charismatic, kind. He is a good runner and swimmer, and knows how to fight with tridents and spears. He is a strong boy, a golden god; an Apollo. Polly, her other tribute, is the exact opposite; the kind of girl who doesn't garner attention.

"You protect her," she tells Finnick. "Long as you can." She does not tell him to run; she tells him to _stand_.

Mags is well past the point of believing that Polly will make it. Polly's a girl like her, mousy-brown and quiet, a fisherman's daughter. She hopes she will, of course, but Polly needs luck and help to survive and Mags is quite sure she won't find either. She tries her best to line up sponsors for both, but everyone only wants to talk about Finnick.

Finnick is true to his word; Polly makes it to the top twelve before a poor girl from District 8, hungry and tired, disembowels her. She’s not good with a knife, District 8 Girl, and the death isn’t fast; Polly bleeds out over the course of hours, not minutes. Mags watches her and feels her slip into the sea of Mag's regrets the second her eyes close. 

Still, even in death, the Games' camera focuses on Finnick, on his pain, his suffering. When the drumbeats go out, the camera doesn't cut to the portrait of Polly. It focuses on Finnick’s face, his torment. Polly’s mother sends Finnick a gift, a trident, and he uses it to kill, to climb to the top of the pile.

When District 8 goes down, hungry and scared, trapped in Finnick’s net, she is glad that he shows mercy and makes her death quick. 

Seconds later, she's sickened that this is what the Capital has turned them into: spectators, hoping for death.

6\. She is 54 when Finnick comes home.

He moves into the house next to hers, as much for comfort as for practicality, she thinks. He stays with her often; she likes to imagine that if she had a son, he might be like Finnick. Finnick doesn’t have any family left, and neither does she at this point, so it’s nice, not to be alone.

“Do you see them?” Finnick asks her, once, a bit drunk on honey wine. “The ones from the Arena?”

She takes a sip of her wine, debates lying to him; decides not to. “Every night. Every time I close my eyes.”

“Me too,” he says. “And Polly.”

She says nothing in response, because there is nothing to say. Instead, she stands and hugs him, lets him cry on her shoulder. The tears feel wet and she feels this, too, flowing out into the sea of regrets, of promises broken. 

She pats his head and breathes in deep and tries to comfort her son.

6\. She is 55 when Finnick’s first tribute dies.

It’s a final twist, she thinks, from the Capitol. Finnick's victory means she doesn’t have to do this alone anymore, but it also means that she has to watch him be tortured as she was. 

And what kills their tributes - and them both - is that their tributes do not die to other children. Wave and Sun come across a tracker jacker hive; within seconds they are screaming. Finnick gets on the phone, trying desperately to get a sponsor to buy them medicine.

Mags shakes her head, presses a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t. It’s too late.”

Helpless, they watch them die, their only comfort the salt-water they share, both silently sobbing.

The ride back to District 4 is long and silent that year.

7\. She is 56 when Annie Cresta is selected for the Hunger Games.

Her heart falls as soon as the shy, small girl is selected. Annie's eyes are downcast, tellings Mags Annie already knows she won’t make it. She’s a thin thing, smaller than Mags was at the beginning of her games, with red hair like a mermaid that flows down to her waist.

“No!” Finnick cries out next to her. “I volunteer! Take me as tribute!” They won’t, of course; Finnick can’t go back, and no one in the audience dares to take the place of shy Annie, quiet Annie. She is quite certain that other than Finnick and her, no one notices Annie at all.

The boy that year is even worse off than Annie, a spindly thing. One of the ever-growing field of their careers volunteers for him, instead. Ben. But there is no one for Annie.

Finnick is angry, out of control, and it frightens Annie. Mags hugs her, tries to keep her close, tells her “Run, swim, _go_ \- the further out you get, the better you’ll be. Be the waves, Annie.”

She doesn’t expect it to come in handy, but then there’s water, water all around her, and Annie swims, and she _swims_ , and Finnick grabs Mag’s hand and holds it tight and they’re both screaming, screaming “SWIM! SWIM!”

When the last of District 2’s tributes drowns, her body being shown floating in some sick sort of artistic display, Annie is victor.

Annie, somehow, comes home to them. They surround her with blankets and hugs and whispers of praise. It doesn't help. Annie shivers, her eyes focused on a far-away ocean none of them can see.  
  
Still, she's alive, and in the end, that's all that matters. 

8\. Mags is 57 when things settle into the new normal.

It isn't ideal. Annie never fully recovers; still spooked by ghosts that appear with every lapping wave.  Finnick is forced to disappear to the capital for long periods of time and won’t explain why, though Mags knows and says a silent prayer of gratitude. Finnick is still protecting Annie.

Annie moves into the house next to Finnick but spends most of the time split between Finnick's and Mags. Her family lives with her but don’t understand Annie like they do. 

Mags does though, as does Finnick. They're not unhappy, the three of them. Mag's days are easy enough most of the time: work with Finnick on the nets, with Annie on the hooks. Twice a year, she’s called upon to go back to the Capital, and she and Finnick share an unspoken agreement that Annie will never need mentor. 

She will do it in Annie’s stead.

It’s a hard existence, but not an unjoyful one.

9\. She is 76 when she first sees Katniss Everdeen.

She watches her on the beach, with Annie, with Finnick - all watching this brave girl as she runs and jumps. She’s district 12, resourceful; Mags thinks, still, of the teenage girl from the same district, all those years ago. Katniss jumps and shoots to kill. She is deadly and beautiful and Mags hopes, for her sake, that the girl will survive, somehow. She's not a soldier, but something different, something more. Mags knows a winner when she sees one.

Her children are not winners. They come to her more and more like soldiers every year. District 4 has a proud campaign of soldier children they bring up as careers, and even if Mags finds it distasteful she cannot quite complain. At least these parents are prepared for the fact that their children may die.

She advises them to the best of her ability, but she's curious about Katniss. After their own mentees are wiped out - rockslide and District 2’s male tribute, respectively - both she and Finnick root for her.

They've always had a soft spot for rebels in District 4. When Mags was young there would be pirates who raided the sea in hopes of capturing supplies bound for the Capitol. Now they have careers, and _tessera_ , and they are starving and dying. Let Katniss show the Capitol, she thinks; let them see the girl on fire and  _know_  it is their own house they are burning down. 

They both watch as Katniss holds the nightshade in her hands, offering Peeta a death that will spite the President and his cronies. When Mags sees it, her blood stills, and she realizes: Katniss is not just thumbing her nose at them. She’s dangerous, inspirational; a rebel.

When she meets her two years later, she feels the same. Katniss spearheads a rebellion without realizing it, and Mags is happy to be in the conspiracy surrounding her. The ghosts watch from the distant shore, their eyes less accusatory than usual.

10. She is 80 when she dies.

She dies for Finnick, for Annie, for Katniss, for Peeta. She throws herself into the fog, screaming not at the pain she _feels_ but at the pain, she has been forced to bear all these years. Ghosts upon ghosts upon ghosts of dead children. She throws herself against the Capitol, knowing it will fail, and not caring.

She sees them all at the end, as she knew she would. The tributes, the hungry district 12 girl, her sister, the other tributes, all of them killers, made to kill. Killers them all for no reason - and in her last words she screams the advice she has always given. _Run_. Don’t look back.  _Be the wave._

But this time, she hopes they are running toward a better, more distant shore. She closes her eyes as she dies, thrashing against the poison’s deadly effects, and prepares to meet the other tributes.

They meet her at the edge of the water, and walk onward onto the eternal island. They understand her, and now, she understands them. They have waited for her, even after all this time.

They will wait, and watch, and hope that theirs is the last generation to live on salt and pain. 


End file.
